Title: Optimal investment in power system for defending against malicious attacks through defender-attacker-defender model and mixed strategy Nash equilibrium

Authors: Ali Marjanian; Soodabeh Soleymani

Addresses: Department of Electrical Engineering, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran ' Department of Electrical Engineering, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran

Abstract: One of the most important infrastructures in a country is the electric power grid. Undoubtedly, the performance of other critical structures severely depends on the power system. In this paper, the problem of protecting the system is formulated as a three-player game (defender-attacker-defender). The optimal strategy for the above game is obtained based on mixed strategy Nash equilibrium (MSNE). This study employed a genetic algorithm to seek the mixed strategy Nash equilibrium point. The results in this study show that: 1) the application of the three player game theory model could provide an optimal investment strategy for power systems against malicious attacks; 2) line-switching is a useful tool for improving the power network performance; 3) the proposed model accounts for the relationship between the defending budget, recovery time and the expected payoff; 4) using GA to solve MSNE allows to obtain the optimal response in an agreeable time.

Keywords: electric grid defence planning; game theory; mixed strategy Nash equilibrium; MSNE; malicious attack.

DOI: 10.1504/IJCIS.2017.089242

International Journal of Critical Infrastructures, 2017 Vol.13 No.4, pp.354 - 373

Received: 19 Nov 2016
Accepted: 11 May 2017

Published online: 10 Jan 2018 *

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